Background and Turo’s Announcement
Turo periodically announces policy and other changes via its Turo Host newsletter. These changes are frequently leaked or hinted at prior to their announcement.
What Changes Did Turo Announce?
Turo announced a few changes:
- Book Instantly will be the new default starting next year. No more requests to
book - New guest ID verification. Turo will now send a message 24 hours before the trip starts prompting the guest to upload their drivers license (you still need to verify)
- New maintenance documentation requirements:
a. If your car is unlisted for a maintenance issue you will now need to hire a certified mechanic to make the repairs. You will then need to upload a picture of the paid itemized invoice to get the car relist
b. Host may no longer fix the following types of issues themselves, internal components (armrests, door panels, glove box), or window issues such as windows that don’t open or close, or damaged, cracked, or chipped glass
4. New tire and battery age requirements. Annual safety inspections must now include the age of the tires and the battery. Tires can’t be older than six years and the battery must be less than five years old.
What Do These Changes Means To Turo Hosts?
Reading between the lines, there are a few takeaways for me here.
Book Instantly
The most interesting change is the Book Instantly requirement. By requiring all vehicles to be booked instantly Turo can then make more partnerships with direct booking agencies, such as Kayak, Hopper, and others. This should increase Turo’s and host’s revenues by putting Turo vehicles in front of a larger audience. If you read my last blog post then this makes perfect sense because I predicted Capital One Travel is on Turo’s radar as the next major Online Travel Agency partner.
However, I have some reservations (get it? 😉 ) about this new direction. Turo partially justifies this change on its website by saying, “…Historically some hosts have kept Book Instantly turned off so they can manually screen each guest before deciding to accept their booking or not. This type of host screening, unfortunately, can be discriminatory, which isn’t behavior we want in the Turo community. Rest assured that Turo currently screens every guest and trip, using a constantly evolving, machine learning model to assess risk.”
That’s a lovely social PR piece, Turo. You’re right though, I DO discriminate. I discriminate against smokers, people who steal cars, people with poor reviews, and other troublesome folks. I’m not sure why this is “unfortunate”. Additionally in the last few months I have felt like Turo support has been increasingly hostile towards its hosts by making us overly defend ourselves and provide 110% convincing evidence of poor guest behavior in order to get reimbursed for basic damages to our vehicles. Turo has been making other host-unfriendly changes recently as well ($150 smoking fee that always seems to be denied unless you call 17 times?), so forcing hosts to accept instant bookings for guests that Turo has “vetted”, while also acting increasingly hostile towards hosts who report damage, has me a little worried. It feels like Turo is forcing hosts to expose their property to potentially troublesome guests and then turning a blind eye to the aftermath of renting to someone like that.
Not their problem, I guess. They just need to boost their earnings as high as possible so they look good at their upcoming IPO valuation.
New Guest ID Verification
This is great. Sending those messages to everyone has been annoying.
Maintenance Changes
I think the requirement to have a shop do most of the work is a little onerous to me, especially since I am mechanically inclined and prefer to work on my own vehicles. I actually think I do a better (safer) job than they do since it is my vehicle. But I also know there are hosts who aren’t thinking of their guest’s safety and are just trying to save money…so maybe this will be overall safer for guests. I can’t help but think of how long my cars are going to be down while I wait for my [overburdened] shop to perform a simple repair.
As for the tires and battery I think these changes make sense. Turo has to pay for roadside assistance and towing, and I’m sure these changes will cut down on those expenses. Tires and batteries don’t last much longer than that for me anyway. I don’t mind Turo raising the bar on safety and common sense things like this.
Conclusion
We’ll see how this goes. Hopefully Turo has heard the message from hosts that in order for us to feel confident allowing Instant Book we need to trust that Turo has actually vetted these folks and that they will stand by us when we reach out to them to report poor guest behavior.
